


Rhetoric (and Other Balms)

by gaolcrowofmandos (imperialhuxness)



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, Mentions of Glue-Sniffing, Olfactory Triggers, Public Relations Debacle, The Grieving Process What Is That
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-19
Updated: 2017-08-19
Packaged: 2018-12-17 04:51:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11844303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imperialhuxness/pseuds/gaolcrowofmandos
Summary: /rhetoric: n. language that is intended to influence people and that may not be honest or reasonable/The Second Kinslaying left several high-level vacancies in the command structure at Amon Ereb. Amras finds himself in need of a public relations expert. Luckily, he has the most convincing voice of the Noldor on hand--or he would, if he could just get Maglor to be of use. Maglor, however, remains resolutely unhelpful.





	Rhetoric (and Other Balms)

You sit with your remaining brother in the common room, the hearth before you lifeless. You’ve been back about two weeks, and your brother is staring into space, trying to dull his mind. You’re sharpening arrows, trying to busy your hands.

You _miss_ making your own arrows, don’t you? You miss the tiny wood shavings and the sandpaper against the shaft and the scent of glue like a burst of stars in your brain. The youngest of six (not seven anymore) used to have time for a hobby, but now -

You are two.

You built Tyelko and Moryo and Curvo’s pyres by the riverbank, you and Russandol and Makalaurë. You burned your fingers lighting them. (you couldn’t see, you were crying, it was like looking at the world through a cut diamond, all blurred colors and unnatural angles.) You burned your fingers lighting them, so even as you covered your nose while you watched, you still smelled charred flesh. Russandol stalked off before they were half ash, and he’s apparently frozen to death in the woods. (you’re sure that did Dior’s kids _oh-so-much_ good. it certainly didn’t help you.)

But you are two now, and you have to _officiate_ instead of notch and fletch. You sharpen arrows at night, which just isn’t the same as seeing the whole process through, but you like something about the mindless repetition and the facade of productivity.

These days, Makalaurë isn’t much for productivity - he’s given up on facades, too - and damn it, it’s started to irk you. You can’t be expected to fill five pairs of boots (all very much bigger than yours) on your own -- and then… and, well-- there’s also how--

(all these years after Losgar you’re no better at being alone.)

So, “Makalaurë,” you say delicately, turning to face his chair, “the people are asking if you’re well.” 

“They are,” he answers, without inflection. His voice is like blowing on a dandelion and watching the white fuzz float off on the wind.

You sigh. What were you really expecting? You’ve gotten nothing out of him but terse declaratives since - since he locked the doors two weeks ago.

It was the first thing he did after you got back to Amon Ereb: locked your dead brothers’ bedroom doors with four little clicks like breaking bones, and with the iron key steady in his hand. Maybe he thought that would ward off decay (if you sealed the sepulchres air-tight), but there are no corpses rotting here, just ghosts.

Ghosts, you’ve discovered, don’t give a damn about latches and cylinders. They slip through the cracks under doors and effuse through holes in walls. (You figure Curvo’s ghost carries pins in its pocket, picks the locks, and shuts the doors behind it quick enough to stun the ravished bolts silent, and make the doors appear unmoved.)

Before the hearth you’re sitting in the echo of a fifth click, a metaphorical click like your metaphorical ghosts. You’re trying so hard to be deaf to it. 

“The people are wondering,” you go on, “why their lawful lord hasn’t put in an appearance at the restructure meetings.” You pause, hoping. He says nothing. “I’ve assigned the remainder of Russandol’s men to you, as well as Tyelko’s command. Carnistir’s men and my own have mingled enough over the years, so I’ve taken his troops. I’ve taken Curvo’s death squads, too. You should thank me for that.” You add the last bit with a splintered sort of laugh.

“Thank you.” His tone hasn’t changed.

“You should be involved.” No response.”The people have already begun speculating about your absence. I mentioned the leading query -”

“If I am well.”

“Yes,” you say, “but I didn’t mention the speculation itself. When I tell them you’re hale and uninjured, they smile. And they say, ‘Ah, he must be composing quite the lament for our fallen.’” You let that sink in, or at least you wish it would. Then you go on.

“That’s what they think of you, that you’re the great minstrel in some artistic fervor, stringing notes together so all our grief sounds beautiful. That’s the only plausible reason they see for their lord _abandoning his responsibilities_.”

“Oh.”

“I don’t have the heart to tell them you haven’t written a word.” You purse your lips. “Or washed your hair.” You scrape your flint noisily. “Or changed your clothes.”

While you’ve been on the other side of the citadel dealing with affairs military and public (the bestowing of posthumous medals, the reordering of command, the filling of gaps in the border patrols), he has been sitting for two week with the ghosts.

“I wanted to give you some space,” you say, keeping rhythm with the flint now. “It’s been hell on both of us, and I know - between the weather and the Orcs, there wasn’t time to process any of it on the march back. I know,” you repeat, and exhale. “But, barring a second resurrection on Russandol’s part, you’re Lord of whatever is left of this house. The people need you. I need you.”

He sits there in silence for a minute, twisting a lock of hair around his thumb.

Then he says, “So you want me to write a song.”

“It would be a nice gesture--” Here you shrug. Pointedly. “--after all they’ve sacrificed for us.” Here you look down and straighten your arrow’s feathers. “But really,” you say, “I would settle for a decent display of leadersh--” He cuts you off.

“You want me to write a fucking song.” His gaze pivots toward you with a spark that immediately gutters. “After all this, that’s what you want--the fucking bard to come out with a fucking _serenata lacrimosa_ , with a few hyperbolic lyrics and a few _adagio_ chords, and convince you all that nobody died in vain.” They’re angry words, but they don’t sound that way when he says them, utterly without affect. They sound defeated.

But you pick up another arrow, put your flint to the head, and say conversationally, “Historically you’ve found music a highly effective processing mechanism.”

And he says, with a phantom sneer, “ _Historically_ we’ve let you sit and stare at the side of a tent for three months to _process_. Repay the favor we all gave you after Losgar. Please.”

You swallow memories of frozen ground, your father’s tears, and incessant, chest-deep coughing (coughing to get the sensation of ashes out of your throat). _“Psychosomatic,”_ Carnistir had kept saying, _“it’s psychosomatic.”_ He was proud of the word. It was the first time he’d gotten to use it outside a classroom.

After a moment you tell him you wouldn’t describe early-stage catatonia as terribly _effective_ at Losgar either. “But besides,” you go on, “I had the luxury. Dad and the rest of you were there to handle government.”

“You think we weren’t grieving, too?” He runs a hand through his hair, which is so oily it barely falls back in place. “We had to lead. We gave you what you needed. Leave me alone.” The request is less _non-sequitur_ than it should be. 

“Makalaurë,” you say. You’re holding your flint tight, hands rigid. For the moment you’re successfully keeping yourself from throwing it at him. “The trouble is, we certainly _don’t_ have the luxury of losing a lord this time. Especially not the eldest left. You’ve picked up Russandol’s mantle before. Why can’t you do what you did at Mithrim? Soldier onward?”

 

_The two of you shouldn’t be out walking. The fumes off the mountains hang low tonight, and you’ve had to pull your scarf over your nose to filter the sulfur-stench. The vapors coalesce and writhe over the surface of the lake like dancing ghosts, cast red by the dim glow northward. Forget about shining stars, a smoke curtain falls on the hour of your meeting._

_“It smells like Dad’s workshop,” says Makalaurë abruptly. He’s walking between you and the lake, nose and mouth exposed._

_“Does it?” You wouldn’t know; you spent even less time in there than he._

_“During one of the laboratory phases, I guess it was before you were born. Maybe it was the last stage between jewel smithy and forge and - “ His lip curls a little bit, which you hear more than see._

_“Propaganda machine?” you supply._

_“Granddad and Maitimo might debate such literal phraseology,” he says, almost lightly, and you do see him shrug, a shifting shadow in your peripheral vision. “But I don’t know, I think it’s the right idea, with the helms and the blades, and especially the shields. But then I can’t have read more than two or three books on the subject, politics, you know, I--” He stops prematurely, like cutting off a loose thread before he can tug on it too long. Before he knows it, his whole cloak would unravel._

_“You didn’t know what was coming. We would have all read more if we had.” You glance at him, and a flare of red light above the smoke shows out a faint smile, before both flash and expression fade._

_He makes no reply, and you walk in silence. The two of you do this most nights, though the vapors are seldom this noisome. (you’re neither of you good at being alone.)_

_You adjust your scarf and pull your cloak tighter around your shoulders. It may smell like a workshop out here, but there’s none of the heat. You’ll manage, though. Your days in Mithrim are numbered._

_“I’ve been meaning to ask,” you say, as casually as you can, ignoring the cold that settles in the pit of your stomach, “when are we going south?”_

_You’ve been trying to get your head around withdrawing (around abandoning the war, around_ taking Moringotto at his word _). The weather will be better, and you and your brothers can bide your time on your Oath. (You all certainly won’t keep your word to_ Moringotto , _whether you get Maitimo back in the bargain or not.) It’ll be better. You’ll wait together and lick your wounds. It’ll be--_

_“Who said we’re going south?”_

_“You did,” you say, “or rather you said nothing?” Makalaurë called no council after Moringotto’s messengers left, and Curvo said that meant his mind was made up (oh, the perks of autocracy)._

_But now Makalaurë is shaking his head, and his lip twitches a little._

_“Wait. We aren’t?” You grab his arm, stopping him. “What do you mean?”_

_Your scarf sags. Your brother turns to face you, and the watchfires across the lake twinkle behind his back like so many fruits of Laurelin. (like so many bellows.) (like so many ships.) Your breath catches in your throat, and sulfur fills your lungs._

_“I mean we have a war on our shoulders,” says Makalaurë, with a sort of equilibrium. You pull your scarf back up and wheeze into it for a moment._

_“This- “ you try to say, “this isn’t what anyone is expecting--”_  

 _“Of me?” He pivots forward and starts walking again; you nod and fall in step. He keeps talking._  

 _“The people really think I would abandon the Oath--and the Jewels--and Dad’s memory,” he says slowly, as if tasting the idea, and trying not to spit it into the silt under his boots, “all at Moringotto’s word, all for the barest hope of getting Maitimo back.” He pops his lips. “What the hell do they take me for?”_  

_“You’re, well--,” and you don’t know how to say it._

_To the people he’s the_ bard _. And the bard is harp strings and handkerchiefs and decrescendos._

 _You don’t know how to say it, so you euphemize: “The people, they’ve-- they’ve heard the_ Noldolantë _too many times.”_

_To them, the bard is the epitome of the individual over the cause. The bard is all sentiment and no spine._

_“The_ Noldolantë _?” says your brother, and sighs. “They must be missing the point of it.”_

_“Okay?”_

_This is Mithrim, and smoke hides the stars. You finger bows, not harps. And the bard is-- the bard --_  

_The bard--_

The king.

_“That song,” he says, “isn’t a dirge or a tragedy or an apology. It’s a bildungsroman.”_

_And you tug your scarf higher, for it smells like death out here._

 

“You call _that_ soldiering?” The listless dandelion spores are back in his voice. “Try _good acting_.”

“I don’t see the difference.” You put your flint back to the arrowhead. 

Your brother sits silent for a minute, clenching and unclenching his fingers in his lap, then he stands. You hear his back pop with the stretch.

“Very well,” he says, a bit faintly. “I’ll write a song.” He turns to leave the hearthside and skulk down the hall to his own room. “And I’ll wash my hair,” he calls back, even softer.”

“Thank you,” you say, and lift another arrow as he disappears down the corridor.

Before you take the flint to the point, you hear the fifth click. He’s locked himself up like the ghosts.

* * *

Your brother barely leaves the crypt of his bedroom for two days, but you’re prepared to take it as a positive sign. He has a tendency to disappear when the artistic fervor seizes him. You hope for his sake it has. You’re letting him off easy, hoping a few days of creative processing might ease his transition back to the land of the living.

On the third evening, you whet ten arrows, and don’t miss him much in the common room. But don’t you think it’s time you checked on him? You inhale, stand, and head down the hall to his room. 

Braziers flicker dimly on the walls, and the doors of your dead brothers’ rooms are like empty picture frames gaping out of the stone.

It’s nearly spring, and the dampness of Southern Beleriand has begun to seep into the citadel. The empty halls smell so much like a cave that you want to throw up. That dank, musty limestone scent permeated the air at Menegroth like a persistent harmony, never quite absent beneath the coppery odor of blood and the battle stench. Now the cave-smell itself is the smell of death to you. Amon Ereb reeks of it.

But you still breathe deeply once you’ve stopped outside Makalaurë’s door. You knock after a moment, but your own key is in your pocket, just in case. 

“Makalaurë?”

“It’s unlocked.”

You turn the knob and enter, find your brother at his desk, his back toward the door. It’s a small room with a single window. A white hydrangea grows against the other side of the glass; the sunset filters through its blossoms and casts strange, runic shadows across the desk.

Makalaurë’s collection of instruments sit on a shelf above the writing table. Lute, piccolo, two harps, a viol. They all look dusty.

You stand to the right of his chair and bend to examine his work. Two sheets lie to his left, completely covered in curling, staggering lines of notes. You notice it isn’t the lined paper he generally uses for compositions, and you also notice that he’s only drawn in a few staffs to remedy this.

There’s a third sheet between his elbows, half-coated in the same fashion. You don’t see any _tengwar_ to indicate lyrics.

You ask if it’s the lament.

He says he doesn’t know.

You try again: “Well, what’s it about then?” Everyone knows Makalaurë’s music doesn’t need lyrics to tell a story. 

“Nothing,” he says.

“‘Nothing?’” you echo. “So if I started playing it, the Void would appear before us?” You reach for the viol and bow on the shelf in front of you. (It isn’t his instrument of choice, but he still taught you and Ambarto, long ago.)

“No,” he says, “there’s nothing philosophical about it.” He shakes his head. “It’s just a bunch of notes strung together.”

“I don’t believe you,” you say, then blow some dust off the body of the viol, without touching it. “You’ve always been Master Moral-of-the-Story. You always write with a point.” You smile, but he doesn’t, just sits there quietly for too many heartbeats.

“Fine,” he says at last, slowly. “It’s about Ungoliant, or one of her brood, or maybe just a common garden spider in the winter. Either so insatiable or so famished that she destroys herself, which doesn’t resolve her problem.” He twists his pen and snorts, “You know, I think it’s the lament after all.”

“So that’s what you think of them?” you ask, meaning all your dead. “A bunch of conniving spiders that couldn’t help but commit suicide?”

“‘Couldn’t help’ is a bit strong,” he says. “It’s closer to ‘realized-the-consequences-too-late.’”

“Of... eating yourself?”

“Of destroying yourself, and everything you have, and everything you once stood for, to no purpose at all.” His voice and his grip on the pen both tighten at once.

And you? You can’t dignify those kind of histrionics. Merited or not, the despair doesn’t _help._

“That’s… probably not going to leave the best impression on the people,” you say.

“It isn’t for them.” 

“Not for them?”

“Look,” says Makalaurë, and drums his fingers briefly on the wood (a salvo of taps, then stillness). “I tried to write about them. Some kind of soothing, elegiac ode. I can’t do it. It always comes back to us, the six of us and this web we’ve spun and gotten stuck in.”

“They’re every bit as doomed as we are.” Námo minced no words about that.

“They don’t have Everlasting Darkness hanging over their heads.” 

You can’t argue that point, and you refuse to follow this thread of thought out into the shadows, where it ends and the ghosts gnaw at it.

So you try to answer lightly, “Look, there’s nothing wrong with writing about--” Here you swallow. “--the four of them. It’s good for the people to remember their lords, and it’s good for them to remember we’re grieving too, just - lay off the symbolism and the doom. And the anthropomorphism in general, if you can help it.

“Memorialize the good. Write about oh, I don’t know, a very literal conversation with something that _eats_ spiders, if you have to include them. Tyelko would have appreciated a verse about that, I’m sure.”

“Yeah,” says Makalaurë, “he would have.” You see his lips twitch upward, just a bit.

“But watch out in your verse about Moryo. No excessive gushing.”

“No,” Makalaurë agrees, “he’d be so embarrassed.”

You both fall silent, so you walk over and open the window, loosening a few hydrangea petals. They fall into the room as you pull the panes. A warm breeze blows in, a southwesterly wind up Sirion from the Sea. (you know the smell.)

“So are you ever going to finish it?” you ask him, returning to the desk.

“Are you going to ride out hunting soon?”

You can’t tell if he’s teasing (hobby for hobby, slim chance and none), but you laugh anyway. “Are you trying to get me to say ‘no,’ just so you can stick your nose in the air and say, ‘Neither will I keep writing’?”

“Actually,” he says, and his voice is quiet but stiff, “I was going to ask if I could accompany you.” 

“You _would_ ?” You can’t dilute the incredulity in your voice, but - But maybe half his gloom really is theatrics. Maybe this is _working_ , and he’s getting better.

“Stimulates the muse,” he replies, shrugging. 

“All- all right,” you manage. There’s already a litany of objections stampeding through your brain: _too much to do, I have to finalize the sentinel rotations, I have to brief the rest of the newly promoted captains, I have to take stock of the armory, I have to -_

But here is Makalaurë, and his pen is twirling, and he’s written real music notes, even if you’re too rusty to know whether the composition is any good, and even if there are no staves behind them anyway. Here is Makalaurë, and _his lips keep twitching upward._ Just a bit.

So you say again, “All right,” more certain this time.

* * *

 

The undergrowth devours the sunlight, absorbing the thin white shafts that part the elm leaves overhead. Midafternoon near the eaves of Ossiriand means tremulous green shadows and the muffled chitchat of your men behind.

 Gelion is still a few leagues out, and you purposed to ride that far, to the previous extent of - not your _borders_ , for there’s never been such a thing, but to the old edges of the patrols.

Ostensibly, the reason for your excursion is to determine optimal locations for new outposts. (in reality you’re attempting to lure Makalaurë back to war-lordship with an oh-so stimulating wilderness ride.) But the sunshine is good for the both of you. 

“As discussed at the first council,” Eredmir, Russandol’s sort-of regent, is saying, “we were forced to withdraw from all outposts shortly after midwinter. We weren’t anticipating such a blizzard this far south, and then as soon as the snow had begun to melt, the Orc raids started.” He swallows, and the next words come out _thinly_ : “We were-- hilariously outmanned.” 

 _Hilarious._ His son took an arrow to the throat in Menegroth. Of course he wishes we’d left more troops behind.

“After we had withdrawn from the garrisons, I--” ( _Garrisons_ , he says, but he means little more than guard cabins. Sometimes he still thinks he’s at Himring, turning the gears of an impenetrable machine.) “--started sending out patrol squadrons at intervals, running as far west along Andram and east toward Gelion as they can in a day’s time.” 

“So,” says Makalaurë, “no permanent positions at all any longer?” Oh, good. At least he seems to be recalling that this briefing is largely for his benefit.

“Yes, my lord.” The man sounds a bit weary, and he slows his mount even further. Your party was going at a steady gallop across the plains, but now the maze of roots has forced you to slow to a walk. “No permanent positions, nor any assignments longer than twelve hours. All squadrons report immediately back to Ereb at the end of their rotations.” 

“And it seems,” you’re compelled to add, “that the shorter range provided pitifully little advance notice of the raids.” Your brother is quiet for a minute.

“What about the Laiquendi?” he says at last. “Haven’t they still been informing us?”

“My. Lord.” Eredmir bites off the words. “This is the edge of Lindon,” he says, “the land of music. What do you hear?”

The woods are silent. You were expecting it--they told you how your last allies had fled--but you haven’t stopped to notice it. Until now. You hear _nothing._

No eerie soprano choruses like breaking glass vases, no chords from harps strung with hair. Not even the throb of a wardrum. Between ephemeral snatches of birdsong and the slow, incessant shuffle of the mounts’ hooves over desiccated leaves, is strung a sort of maddening tinnitus, as if in the soil and the lichen and the musty air hangs an echo of Song. 

“The Laiquendi withdrew their tactical support and then their presence,” says the steward, pursing his lips, “around midwinter.”

“Hm.” Makalaurë makes the sound, so you look back at him. He’s compulsively working his fingers through his mount’s grey mane. A green shadow, like there are in the woods, covers half his face. “Who’d keep a partnership with Kinslayers?” says your brother Canafinwë, whose voice is like the Sea. 

And some of the chitchat behind falters. Damn it. Damn _him_.

“Not so loud,” you hiss at him. “Not with that word.”

“What word?” He looks up from the tangle he’s made of the mane. “ **KINSLAYER**?”

“Shut the _fuck_ up.” You’re still hissing. (there’s no better word for it.) “We’re not _using_ that word currently.” You ignore Eredmir’s snort.

“Oh?” says Makalaurë.

“It’s a _slur_ ,” you tell him, jerking your head back towards the men. “It’s terribly demoralizing.”

“It’s the truth.”

“Hence why it’s demoralizing.”

You aren’t about to wait for a reply - _you can’t have this argument, not here, not now, and if he’s spontaneously acquired such an active moral compass that he can’t understand how_ desperately _you need these men, it’s going to be a lengthy argument, and a violent_ \- so you spur your mount ahead.

Your company plods forward in relative quiet for about an hour longer. Splintered green light stripes the dead leaves beneath the horses’ hooves, and the sharp, somehow _green_ scent of the fresh leaves gives the air a wild sort of edge, like it’ll have in a few months when a thunderstorm is brewing. (you inhale, and it’s better than arrow-glue.) It’s spring, you realize, and you’ve hardly been outside. It’s spring, and it’s-- the end of fox-hunting season.

Your brother Tyelkormo would occasionally come south about this time, before the Bragollach, before the Nirnaeth, and before the world started to end. You’d take your men and your mead and your spears on the chase. Your falcons would wheel over your heads, and your hounds would circle the horses or run straight ahead, wailing.

Tyelkormo would take pieces of the kill to the kennels and the falconry to feed them afterward (for roast fox is abhorrent). _“They deserve it,”_ he’d say, and clap your shoulder. “ _They worked harder than I did.”_

 _“Positive reinforcement, right?”_ he’d say, as if he needed an excuse to line his arms with falcons or roughhouse with the dogs. And he named them, every one. 

You didn’t understand; you let him feed your beasts. They were just tools to you, like your bow and spear.

But today you have no more beasts, and today you’re on no leisurely excursion. Progress is slow, and the daylight is waning.

Your mount has fallen into step between Eredmir’s and Makalaurë’s, so you ask the steward, “We won’t make Gelion before nightfall, will we?” Eredmir keeps his gaze fixed ahead.

“I doubt it,” he replies. “Would you prefer we turn back sooner?”

You tell him it’s up to him and kick your mount to a stop, holding up a hand to halt the men behind. “You know the conditions out here,” you say. “Will we be safe returning in the small hours of the morning?”

“Most likely, with this large a group,” he says. “However, I’m loath to risk lives these days. There’s a terrible shortage of them.”

You don’t rise to the bait, instead nodding your permission to give the order. Makalaurë just sighs, soft yet defiant, like a true grandson of _Fíriel_.

You turn the horses, and you, your brother, and the steward soon emerge at the van of the company again. The horses foot their way out of the forest, around the trailing roots and fallen limbs, through a seamless carpet of russet leaves.

Once out of the woods, your company is riding unsheltered into the sunset. Andram spreads out west behind Amon Ereb, distant green lumps in the red light like bleeding, toothless gums.

Makalaurë tangles the mane in silence for a while, but his fingers freeze when Eredmir falls behind the two of you and into conversation with one of the captains. He nudges his mount closer to yours, so you’re riding almost shin to shin.

“Do you know his name?” he whispers, leaning toward you. You blink.

“Whose name?”

“Eredmir’s son,” he says, “what was his name? I’m going to put in a canto about him.” 

“I already gave him a medal--you ought to make someone else’s son a hero,” you say, and spur the animal. Your brother keeps pace with you.

“All the same,” he answers, voice still low, “I’d like to include him. What was his name?”

“I don’t know.” You purse your lips. “I saw him die, I knew his face, I told the liaison to the medal craftsman it was for Lord Eredmir’s son. I think Tyelkormo knew, I saw them speaking a few times.” For Tyelkormo wrestled the hounds and fed the falcons out of his hand. And named them. (You’ve never named your tools before. It’s a hard skill to learn, isn’t it?)

“Well, Tyelkormo’s not he--” Makalaurë starts, but the sentence fizzles out half-said. He shakes his head, mutters _dammit_ , then looks up again. “He was young, wasn’t he?” 

“He looked it,” you say. “Is that tragic enough to sing of?”

“Better material than the Lay of the Six Spiders.”

You smile a little. He’s starting to understand, and you’ve quite warmed up to the idea of a song. A little propaganda never hurt anyone.

Especially not when you’re terrible at this.

 

 _"Were there pyres built to honor all those slain," Eredmir says, and his lips are quivering, though his chin is high, "or only for your brothers?"_  
  
_"We had neither the time nor resources to do so." You dig a fingernail into the wood and trace a jagged line through the cedar. "The rest of the men were communally interred."_  
_  
_ _"Communally interred?" he replies, and his lips go steady. "Mass graves?_ Mass graves _? After all they'd done for you- all they'd sacrificed, and you tossed their broken_ hröar into a pit and shoveled dirt over it fast enough to forget the debt you owe them.”

_“My lord,” you start, “this is wartime. There’s noth--” He doesn’t hear you.._

_“Mass graves!” He smacks the table hard, and jars the flower vase at the opposite end. “And my boy rotting in the mud by that damned river of sorcery."_

_Heat rises in your face, and you don’t know it, but you look like some strange scarlet cast of your brother Carnistir, skin matching your hair. There’s nothing shameful in a group burial after a battle. You know that, and Eredmir should, too._

_But - what difference does it make? His son is dead, and your brothers are dead. They’re all dead and it_  d o e s n ' t  m a t t e r _about the corpses. But you swallow the fury._

_“What could we have done?” you say with icicle finesse. “It was the most dignified option, given the circumstances. Individual pyres - or one great one - would have burned the forest down, and for a thousand individual graves we’d still be there digging.”_

_“A thousand?” he retorts, apparently distracted. “A_ thousand _? You lost a_ thousand _men?”_

 _“I don’t know the exact figure - “_  

 _He interrupts: “You don’t?” He takes a vitriolic tone, barely contained. “Of course you don’t. You didn’t take the trouble to have someone count, just tossed them in like the carcasses of beasts.”_  

 _“My apologies for the oversight.” You lace your fingers together. “I was burning three of my brothers, and trying to keep one - your liegelord - from wandering off after phantoms. Forgive me a bit of indisposition.”_  

 _He just shakes his head. "Shame on you."_  
  
_"It was better than the Nirnaeth," you press on, "and you should be grateful that we didn't leave them in the caves with the Sindarin corpses, or pile them in heaps and burn them like Orcs."_  
  
_"Like Orcs?" he cries. "Like Orcs? How dare you make the comparison when they died as_ martyrs _for you and your souls. They_ died _for your curse and your father's ghost, and you couldn’t spare a moment to distinguish them! You despicable, ungrateful--"_  
  
_"We are_ all _accursed," you say, no euphemisms and no rage. "My father forced no one to march under his banner. We were all damned together."_  
  
_"No," he says, "no," and tears are streaming down his face now, catching in the scars along his cheekbones. He stands, chairlegs screeching as he shoves backward. "_ You _are the damned ones. And I daresay you've earned it."_  
  
_You're both silent for a moment, then he clears his throat and bows his head briefly._  
  
_"I apologize, my lord," he says. "That was entirely inappropriate."_  
  
_"Indeed."_  
  
_"May I have leave, before I return to my duties, to inform my wife of this matter?"_  
  
_"Of course." You’ve folded your hands in your lap, and you peer up at him like a child who couldn't stand tall if he tried, or a king who can't be bothered to._  
  
_"Thank you, Lord Amras."_  
  
_You nod your reply, and he turns halfway toward the door. You shouldn't let him go like this. This wrathful. You need him._  
  
_"And Lord Eredmir?"_  
  
_He stops, whirls back around. "My lord?"_  
  
_"I'm unsure how to say this, but-" And you attempt an indulgent smile. "Your dedication and leadership in our absence were much appreciated."_  
_  
_ "What other choice," he replies, with an awful simper like a choking vine, "do I have?"

* * *

It’s dark by the time you get back to Ereb.

* * *

You still dream of smoke, and tonight is no different. You’re back at Menegroth, and _somebody’s_ burning _something_. Lamps flicker in alcoves on either side of the tunnel you’re in, and there’s blood smeared on the stone under your boots, quickly being obscured by the smoke pouring into the passage. It swirls around your feet, before your eyes, through your pursed lips and between your clenched teeth.

Yell at your men, tell them to turn around and head back toward the throne room. Maybe you’ll get there in time to put an arrow through Dior’s skull _howprescientofyou_.

Go on, yell. You want to yell _something,_ like--who lit a fire in here this place is made of stone we can’t burn it down or blow it up we don’t have the rightchemicalsRussandolwouldn’tletCurvobringthem -- you can’t hold your breath forever, you know --

The smoke’s coming faster now. You don’t know from which direction; it’s like being caught in a blizzard. You can make out nothing of your men besides the glint of a vambrace here and there and your brothers are dead somewhere it’s like being completelyaloneyou’renogoodatthat -- you can’t hold your breath forev--

You wake up coughing, blinking at the stone ceiling of your bedroom while your diaphragm clenches. You prop yourself up with one elbow and wheeze into the other.

 _“Psychosomatic_ ,” says a ghost, from somewhere inside your head. _“It’s psychosomatic.”_

“Whatever,” you murmur as you catch your breath and lay flat again, twisting your wrists to splay your hands against the mattress.

God above, you’d like to make some arrows.(god above, you’d like the glue scent.) As it is, though, you just breathe the damp smell of Ereb--gently, deeply, deliberately--until you fall back to sleep.

The next morning you’re up with the sun. They started preliminary work on the armory inventory in your absence yesterday, and you’re to be advised on the progress before eight o’clock. 

 _Maybe_ \- maybe if the stock of arrows is low enough, and Makalaurë comes around, you’ll be able to commission yourself as a fletcher. It would do you good. Oh, but you’ve let yourself start hoping--too early. These things take time.

You run a hand over your braid as you step out of the corridor and into the common room. Your brother is pacing in front of the hearth. And he’s _humming_.

You stop. So does he, for a moment. Then he steps toward you almost delicately, like you’re a ghost that might vanish if startled. 

“Ambarussa,” he all but whispers, “will you unlock them with me?” Now you notice he’s fingering the iron key. 

You tell him yes. (what other choice do you have?)

* * *

You half-expect a stench as you open the door to Carnistir’s one-time room. But of course there’s no whiff of mausoleum, no spiders scurrying toward the light--just dust particles caught in the morning sun. He left his curtains open before he left. The sunlight also catches in their embroidery.

“Has it always been like this?” says Makalaurë. 

His eyes roam across the husks of finery that constitute Carnistir’s decorating style: fraying tapestries laced with gold and silver arabesques, the faded bedspread, the rug with a map of the constellations. 

The rug’s unraveling along one edge, as Carnistir had to cut off _Wilwarin_ , the Butterfly, to fit the carpet in this room. You know that the _Valacirca_ is squarely positioned under the bed (as if that will keep the Powers’ Scythe from hanging over your heads).

“He brought it all with him after the Bragollach,” you tell Makalaurë. “I don’t know how he managed it when he was supposed to be _fleeing_ , but you know, he likes--” You purse your lips. “--he _liked_ this kind of stuff, so I guess he didn’t want it to burn.” 

“Well, now it gets to rot.” Makalaurë rounds the bed and peers out the window, which faces north. This high on the hilltop, Region’s hollies are just barely visible, a dark blur on the horizon.

“I’d say we could make use of it,” you say, “you know, give it to some of the people who might need it, if it weren’t so…” You gesture eloquently at the musty decor, with all its tattered edges.

“Pathetic?” suggests Makalaurë. You nod once, sharply. 

Your brother pauses for a moment, then murmurs with a tint of a smile, “What would Dad say?” He shakes his head and turns toward you. “His endless succession of princes over half dead, our armies disgruntled refugees, no finery, no jewels, lords of a little realm between a few empty forests. And all for him.” 

Makalaurë is barefoot, curling his toes around the carpet’s indigo loops. He’s standing on Menelmacar; the white clusters of threads that are the Warrior’s stars encircle his feet. “He’d scoff.”

“Would he, though?” you say, stepping closer to Makalaurë. “He’d have to give us credit--with the _possible_ exception of Turukáno, we’re the last ones standing.”

“We’re on our knees.” 

He isn’t wrong. You glance down and find yourself amid the Remmirath, Varda’s net spread under your feet. You step over it and toward the window. 

“So do we fall on our swords?” you say.

Down the slopes of the hill, your men are conducting exercises, mottled armor still glinting like a dragon’s hoard in the light. Further up, toward the eaves of the citadel, a few children fly a kite. If you’ve got these people, you’ve got an army, and a fighting chance at keeping your Oath. 

Maybe it isn’t fair to them, maybe you ought to tell them to run or rebel, but this is _Beleriand_ , and everyone’s going to die under _someone’s_ banner. Might as well be yours.

“‘Fall on our swords,’” your brother repeats, a bit absently. Then he sighs, and his lip twitches upward. “I suppose not yet.”

* * *

Technically it’s Russandol’s study-cell-office thing that you and Makalaurë are crammed into, knees almost bumping under the desk. It doesn’t feel like Russandol, though (if anything could after the Nirnaeth saw half of him pulverized by Balrogs); it’s starkly decorated  as is his bedroom. At least there are no painful mementos to face, nor was there anything to clean out when you occupied it. Despite the emptiness, however, there’s still not quite enough room for two. 

Your brother sits across from you, as diagonally as possible, his back to the door. He’s hunched over a sheet of paper with real staves on it this time, and his pen moves, not exactly in a flurry, but with a steady, ceaseless rhythm like a minuet in Aman.

You’ve finished your armor commissions ( _a hundred shields, unblazoned, for_ everybody-knows-who-we-are _, not to mention how your treasury is an elaborate fiction, meaning you can’t afford frills)_ , and fumble for a place to let the sheet dry, meticulously shifting your pile of blank paper so as not to bump his hand -- and you _do_. 

“Sorry.” You cringe a little, to your own revulsion. But no, it makes sense to tread delicately- you’d like him to stay here, even if he’s just writing his song and conspicuously not being of immediate use. So you apologize again. 

“What. Oh. You’re fine.” He looks up, chuckles through his nose, and shakes his head. “I don’t know how Maitimo ever got comfortable at this tiny thing.”

“Well, I suppose there’s enough legroom length-wise.” It’s a tall-ish desk, just not terribly broad, elm wood, shot with coffee-colored whorls. Accidental ink dots speckle the surface.

Makalaurë kind of bobbles his head in response, pen hovering over the page before it falls back into rhythm. Before he falls back into his artist’s trance and leaves you alone out here in the universe that is. 

“So,” you say quickly - he looks up. You’ve caught him. “Written anything about him yet, about Russandol?” 

“Yeah.” His lips quirk. “Some lies.”

“Good man,” you tell him, more severely than you mean to. “Such as?”

“Well, I mean…” He twirls his pen in cartwheels over his fingers. “Not necessarily lies, more like legends… tall tales… alternate endings.” He pauses. 

“Okay?”

He’s quiet for a moment, glancing back and forth between your face and his draft, like he’s trying to decide if he’s reached his daily quota for conversation. He chooses you.

“Do you think he found them?” 

“Found what?” For some reason your brain jumps to Silmarils in Angband, long ago, and why the hell would Makalaurë be asking a stupid question like -

“Dior’s kids,” he says. “Do you think found them before he - or they - well - before the snows set in?”

Oh. _Of all the absurd things that could preoccupy him._  

“I don’t know,” you reply. “Probably not. It’s a damn big forest.” You give him a peevish sigh. “Does it _matter_?” 

“I wrote it.”

“Wrote it?” you echo.

“I fancied I ought to contrive some kind of redemptive note in this thing. The people need more than a cut-and-dry lamentation,” he says. “They need something to cling to. So I thought, what if Maitimo did find them? The blizzard came, but what if - what if he kept them warm till all their last breaths? And the snow covered everything.”

 _Ugh._ But your brother is a genius. 

“That, um, that - “ You grope for words. “That is grossly sentimental.” 

“I mean, this song has to have at least _one_ legitimately noble death in it. All despair, and no one hearing it will - “

“No, no no,” you interrupt, smiling despite yourself. “I’m not being critical. It’s perfect, even if it’s mush. The people will lap it up. You’re brilliant,” you add, and squeeze his arm. 

He looks down at your hand like some dying animal has crawled onto him, trailing blood. It’s a look somewhere between pity and revulsion, which contorts his lips downward and softens his eyes.

“There’s no reason it can’t be true, you know,” he says.

“You just called it a tall tale.” 

“It’s hardly an improbable one--” He spreads an almost protective hand over his manuscript. ”--and wouldn’t you sleep better if you believed that--” 

“Region,” you tell him, dipping your pen, “is too big a forest.”

* * *

He finishes it. Of course he does. He gives his first public performance in decades in the Great Hall. You sit in the front row, with Eredmir and his wife in her black dress. (The event was going to be outside, but it’s raining. It’s Southern Beleriand after all, where everything is _damp_.) (at least you had a back-up plan.) 

It’s a bit gauche, honestly. Makalaurë’s at the front of the crowd with extra lamps around him, on stage like a common entertainer. Maybe you were a fool to exploit this aspect of his public image: He’s these people’s _lord_ , not their court jester. 

You’re beginning to squirm in your chair--and not just because your spine is digging into the wooden back--when his fingers strike the harp strings, and everything fades.

At first you think you’re drowning. His voice is beautiful, and somehow you’ve _forgotten_ that, and he starts in Tirion, in the dark, with your father’s voice calling down justice amid the flaring lamps. He skips the blood at Alqualondë and - thank God - the smoke at Losgar. The shipwrecks get a stanza squished between them: lightning, thunder; and pale, bloated bodies floating under the swan-prows. 

Then your father’s dying, and the Enemy’s vapors smother stars. You’re there, and you’re swearing again. In the background, in the very fibers of the moment, you hear Makalaurë singing something about how the mighty King Fëanáro shook his fist at Thangorodrim, but you’re there, and just see Dad’s shriveled, charred hands clutching at the cloak you threw over him. 

Makalaurë’s voice throbs through you like a river underground.

You’re at battles you never won (never fought in). Your brothers’ banners make your heart leap, though you never had flags of your own. Then the Nirnaeth is an act of desperation, not delusion. It passes in a minor key, in stripes--not mires--of blood. It isn’t a rout -- you’re just worried for your men.

Then the Silmaril burns in Doriath, and though it’s just Makalaurë singing, you hear drums and trumpets, and are _there_. (you’re there, though, and the attack is as stealthy as possible, launched in the dark.) Then there are viols in your brain, and everyone dies to the sound of them. 

Eredmir’s son is Seregon, after the flower; the strings weep a solo for him. You get dirt under your fingernails after it’s all over, and _seregon_ will grow on the mound (somehow, if sunlight hits the clearing and _seregon_ by some enchantment decides to grow in a deciduous climate -- but it will). 

Your brothers burn like a sacrifice to a nameless and insatiable god. You smell smoke, and do not think of spiders. Russandol learns of Dior’s boys, and when he stalks off with his guards in tow he isn’t _abandoning you in some fool’s attempt at making amends_. He’s off on a quest that will redeem him and you and your brothers before you and all your martyrs and all their survivors. One noble act of charity, and all your ledgers are wiped clean. 

It takes three cantos, and ends in harp notes, soft and slow, one for each snowflake as it covers your brother and the children in his arms.

The music ceases, and you emerge from dark waters, gasping. You haven’t drowned, but you find your face is wet. You blink for a moment, till the world loses its cut-diamond filter, and a glance around the room reveals hundreds of teary faces. Eredmir’s wife has her arms around her husband, who is bowed in his chair, shoulders trembling, face almost to his knees. 

Gradually, like a thunderstorm being blown in or hot magma finally appearing in the smoke over a volcano, then trickling down the cone, applause surges up amid the sounds of weeping.

There is Makalaurë, with his head bowed before the crowd, clutching his harp to his chest, lip twitching, just a little. You wipe your face and resist the urge to run up and kiss him. _It worked_. _This worked._ If the applause and the tears are any evidence, _it worked. You have them. These people remain yours._

He’s just lifted his head and begun walking toward you, applause still reverberating through the hall like a hurricane in a tank, when you feel a hand on your shoulder.

A voice like glass says, “My Lord Amras?” in your ear. You turn, and it’s one of the captains. God, what’s her name? Ereniel? No, no, it’s Dae - something. Shit, what’s her _name_? 

Whatever. _You have them._ It doesn’t matter anymore.

“Yes, Captain?” you say. You notice her hands are shaking, eyes are _shining_ ? Like she’s happy about something, but there’s no way a sentinel on duty would disturb you for _good_ news. (there isn’t any good news left this side of the Doors of Night.)

“My lord, I have urgent news from the guards at the gate. I’ll tell you plainly, Lord Amras.” She swallows, inhales. “Lord Maedhros has returned.” 

* * *

You’ve grabbed Makalaurë and rushed downstairs, leaving the crying heap that is Eredmir, along with the echoes of applause. The iron braziers here in the entrance hall burn on their stands, and here amid them stands your brother. The other one. The one whom both you and Makalaurë should apparently stop presuming dead, ever.

“Russandol.” You murmur it like a spell, like a secret word Ulfang’s men would use in their heathen rites: with gravity, with humility, with trembling lips.

Russandol just nods. “Apologies for the delay,” he says, hollowly. “We… tried.”

He has four men behind him, and waves them off with a word of dismissal; you think he took twelve in his search party. He looks haggard and famished, even for him. He’s lost his prosthetic. You don’t ask. He keeps clenching and unclenching his flesh hand, making all the delicate bones stand out like leaf veins. He has four men with him.

And no children.

“So you failed.” It’s Makalaurë’s voice from beside you, and it sounds tremulous and watery.

“As I _frequently_ remind myself, Makalaurë,” says Russandol with a wry sort of grimace. “Don’t I get a ‘welcome home’?”

“Yes, yes,” you find yourself answering, even as you steeple your fingers over your nose and mouth and drop them again, still shocked. “God, yes.” You embrace him briefly, working your fingers into his ratty cloak. He smells like grass and perspiration; his clothes are still damp from the rains earlier today.

You step back, shaking, ready to cry for the second time tonight, this time out of relief. You’re not alone anymore. Russandol’s back, and though he won’t lead you all to glory, he at least knows what the hell he’s doing. And the people like him.

“We’ve-” you stammer, “we’ve missed you so much.”

“We, ah, we have,” says Makalaurë, then begins to recover himself. Maybe. “I just… I wrote you the loveliest dirge.”

He says it without levity, almost defensively, but Russandol throws back his head and laughs. You join in vacantly, in a sort of falsetto. Makalaurë manages a simper, though there’s something like confusion in his eyes.

“I might have known,” says Russandol at last, still smirking a bit. “Save it, why don’t you. You’ll need it sooner or later.”

He claps Makalaurë on the shoulder, then shoves between the two of you to leave the hall. You’re by yourselves in silence for a moment. 

“At least his room’s unlocked,” Makalaurë says tepidly.

“Yeah,” you say, “at least it’s unlocked for him.”

After another moment you offer: “I guess this takes the pressure off us. I’m glad he’s back.” Makalaurë’s still holding his harp, you notice. He absently plucks a string.

“ _He_ doesn’t seem too glad to be back,” says Makalaurë.

“Well, would you be?”

“Ha.”

A stiff breeze rushes in through one of the hall’s open windows, heavy with the scent of rain. The wind hits the iron braziers, and the two in line with the window flare up quickly, flames curling like talons. Then they go out, dispersing smoke.

As the smoke wafts toward you, you start coughing, for it smells like death in here.


End file.
